


Mourning Glory

by Starry_Emerald173



Category: Captain America (Movies), Captain America the Winter Soldier, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types, The Avengers - Ambiguous Fandom
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst and Feels, Dark!Bucky, I'm Bad At Tagging, Kidnapping, Obsession, Possessive!Bucky, Reader-Insert
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-11-09
Updated: 2020-11-20
Packaged: 2021-03-08 17:15:29
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 17
Words: 14,115
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27470323
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Starry_Emerald173/pseuds/Starry_Emerald173
Summary: In their line of work, loss is to be expected.That doesn't make it hurt any less.Miraculous resurrections aren't any easier.
Relationships: James "Bucky" Barnes & Steve Rogers, James "Bucky" Barnes/Reader, Natasha Romanov (Marvel) & Reader, Steve Rogers & Reader
Comments: 33
Kudos: 78





	1. Highways and Heroism

**Author's Note:**

> A/n: Whelp, woke up at 3:00 am with this Oopsie Daisy idea having taken firm root in my mind. Uncertain where or how far this will go, but heavy warnings for eventual grief and loss and all the feeeeeeeelllls

"Why don't you try sticking a cork in it?" Sam Wilson shoots back and you trade smiles in the rear view mirror with Steve as Nat leans forward.

"Insight's launching in sixteen hours. We're cutting it a bit close here."

Insight. Hydra.

Jesus.

Your brain is still trying to wrap itself around the whole situation. Everything the last day has revealed. You wouldn't be surprised if your head started literally spinning - full on Linda Blair style - but there isn't time for you to have a little meltdown, crammed knee-to-knee between Nat and Sitwell.

You've been an Avenger for a little over a year, and it's almost comforting to know that you haven't completely lost sight of normalcy because you cannot make this shit up...

"What?" Sitwell demands, pulling your focus back where it needs to be. "That is a terrible, terrible idea."

Thud. The sound draws your attention to the roof of the car.

The glass on the window shatters and there's just enough time for you to see a flash of metal as Sitwell screams and is yanked from the car and thrown several lanes.

"Move!" Nat shoves you aside as whoever is on top of Wilson's suburban-Dad car fires down into the back seat. "Shit!"

More shots as Nat rolls into the front seat, pulling Rogers' head out of the way as if she's psychic, as if by some strange Russian spy alchemy she presciently knows where the shots are going to go.

Rogers doesn't miss a beat, hand reaching for the emergency brake and you brace yourself as the car screeches to a stop and the attacker goes catapulting through the air.

Fuck a duck, you think, watching him roll and use an honest-to-god metal arm to stabilize himself as he skids backwards, then stands. That's not terrifying. At. All.

"Fuck a duck?" Sam asks as Nat draws a gun and you realize you said that out loud.

"Langua-" Nat's quip is cut short as something slams into the car from behind and the screeching of metal and glass and rubber fills your ears as Sam steps on the gas and steers the car towards this nightmare machine machine.

He doesn't move until the last second, and then that metal arm is gripping the front of the car as the Terminator 4.0 belly flops himself onto the roof of the car, pancake style, as if it's no big deal.

"Inhuman?" You wonder aloud, hands finding your own weapons and you discharge a couple shots through the roof. "Terminator? From the second one?"

"Shit!" Wilson swears and you watch with horror as the steering wheel vanishes upwards in a scream of metal, and the car is careening down the overpass, out of control as it gets slammed again.

"Hold on!" Rogers yells, yanking you around to the front.

'Holy shit' is all you have time to think as he body checks the passenger door with the shield and Nat's grip turns herculean as the four of you separate from the car in time for it to begin auditioning for the Winter Olympics' gymnastics team.

Sam falls away first and then you, and thank god for your leather jacket because can you say road rash?

But you take the fall the way you've been taught and you're pushing up to your feet by the time the SUV that rammed you has come to a stop.

The Mystery Terminator is being handed more guns. Oh joy, you think, and then watch in horror as Steve takes a hit directly to the shield, blasting him backwards and clean off the overpass.

There isn't time to gawk or wonder if he landed okay because the Terminator has friends and they're open firing in the middle of the freeway as you, Nat, and Sam duck for cover, and you let hours and hours of training take over.

Nat's the first off the overpass.

You and Wilson clear the deck behind her as the Terminator follows her and Steve. You have to give Steve credit - this latest rescue knows what he's doing and you make a mental note to ask him to show you that quick, efficient little move he did with his pocket knife later if you all survive.

"I got this, go!" Wilson tells you, taking up overwatch position.

Well, you don't need to be told twice.

You follow the commandos over the edge of the overpass and do your job - protect your team, freeing up Steve to run after Nat and Spooky Metal Bastard.

It isn't until after you've dispatched the last commando that you feel the cold, and it isn't until Sam joins you and you see the look of 'oh fuck' on his face that you glance down to see the spill of red - dark, viscous - spilling through your shirt.

Adrenaline is a hell of a drug, but it doesn't keep your legs from going out from underneath you.

"Aww shit, y/n..." The look on his face tells you everything you need to know.

You shake your head at him as he moves to crouch beside you, to do something to stem the crimson tide. "Go. Help Steve." There's the sound of sirens, and you know that where there's sirens, S.H.E.I.L.D.-slash-Hydra won't be far behind. 

There's nothing Sam can do for you, but he can help Captain America. 

"Y/n..."

"Tell Cap," You can feel the wound now and holy hells this isn't how you wanted to go but you can't say you're too surprised. "Tell Cap it was my choice." At his confused look, you show him the mini-grenades you'd pilfered from your last trip through Fitzsimmons' lab. "I'll slow 'em down as much..." You have to let out a slow hiss of air because _mother fuck_ this shit is not pleasant. "As much as I can. Now, go!" You order with the last of your force.

And Sam Wilson leaves you for the greater good to die under an overpass.

Time goes a little sideways on you, and you have to hold fast to consciousness. You're going to take as many Hydra pricks with you as you can, but you have. to. stay. awake.

After a while, you finally hear boot steps. Confident, assured, kill-everything kind of boot steps. Murder walk, you think to yourself, and chuckle a little as you tip your head back against the car you've managed to prop yourself against.

Shock makes your jaw drop as you look at the face of the Spooky Metal Bastard, uncovered now.

"James Buchannon Barnes," You gape like a fish. "Now I've seen every fucking thing."

He crouches in front of you, head tilted, eyes devoid of personality as they skim over you, your gut shot, then back to your face.

"Bucky? Bucky Barnes?" You ask, and think you see a flicker of something behind that glacial expression. 

So much for your plans - you can't be the asshole who blows up Captain America's best friend.

You're losing the battle to remain conscious though.

The last thing you hear before the world goes fuzzy dark on you is a soft voice, asking, hesitantly, like a child, "I'm Bucky?"


	2. It's Not A Platitude

Steve knows he needs to pull it together. Know they’re up shit creek without a paddle, and Sam and Nat’s lives hang in the balance alongside his as Rumlow’s team transports them to the last location they’ll ever see.

Rumlow. The anger is dull, but it’s there, trying to bulldoze its way past this fog hanging over his head. He focuses on it, clenching his fist, trying to pull it closer. Use it to wake his brain back up.

Jesus - Bucky’s  _ alive _ .

What the hell happened to him?

“Hey,” Sam snaps at the guards. “We need a doctor over here. She’s going to bleed out.”

Nat’s face is a wash of pain and Steve feels anger over his own helplessness grow as the guard snaps out an electric baton.

And attacks the other guard.

Three vicious strikes later, the helmet comes off and Maria Hill is staring at Sam.

Sam looks like he’s in love, eyes wide, skin flushed, chest heaving.

“That thing was squeezing my brain,” Hill gripes before looking at him. “Who’s the new guy?”

“Sam Wilson. Sam, Maria Hill.”

Sam double takes. Yeah, Steve thinks, definitely love. “ _ The _ Maria Hill?”

“The one and only.” Maria narrows her eyes at Nat. “Don’t die on me Romanov. You and y/n still owe me for the Tibet thing - I fully intend to cash those chips in someday.”

And Sam’s breath hitches and his eyes flick down and Steve  _ knows _ .

“Y/n?” Hill asks, because the woman misses nothing.

Sam’s glance is remorse and regret as he looks at Steve. “I’m sorry, man. There wasn’t...wasn’t anything…”

“It’s okay.” He tells him, though a screaming void has opened up inside him. “She knew the risks.” It’s not a platitude. He means it, he does, because you  _ did _ and you still ran with him and Nat anyway. But losing another friend - he doesn’t have enough of them to go around as it is. Let alone ones who help him work through the future-list with relentless cheer and humor. 

That’s to say nothing of quiet nights spent talking - Hell, he’s practically taken over your guest bedroom at this point, that’s how frequently his feet end up walking him through D.C. in the middle of the night. And you’re always awake, never sympathetic or judgemental.

He knows Rumlow - and others - had suspicions about that, but the truth?

Steve Rogers is a lonely sonovabitch, and you and Nat are the closest thing to family he’s had since he came out of the ice. There have been days where you’re both the only thing keeping him from laying down and never getting back up.

It’s not that Steve wants to die.

It’s just that most of the time, living is so damn  _ hard,  _ and there are times he wants to beat his hands bloody against a bag with frustration over how his life - his death - turned out.

'Til the end of the line. That's what he promised Bucky, and when Bucky died...Well, putting that plane into the water made him feel like he hadn't quite missed the stop. But this world? He feels like he fell asleep on the train and woke up in Jersey. Everything is alien, and strange, and while the vast majority of changes are good - the internet, the food - he's still out of step with the world.

It’s going to be harder without you there to drag him along, laughing at both of you when you miss a beat - knowing he led you to your death.

Hill and Sam get to work on freeing him and he lets his head fall back against the wall.

Bucky’s alive.

You’re gone.

S.H.I.E.L.D. is Hydra.

The thought cuts through the fog like a knife and he’s so damn grateful for it, because he knows what he has to do now.

They have to stop Insight, still, and then?

Then he’s going to finish the job he started back in Europe.


	3. There is no 'or'

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Thanks for the comments and kudos all! Seriously could not wait til my break at work to write this next chapter 🥰

_ “Steve, meet Y/n. Y/n, Steve.” Nat’s smile is sharp and incandescent as you stare up at Captain America. “Y/n, be nice.” _

_ You stick your tongue out at her, because Romanov needs to be kept in check, and she laughs as the Quinjet continues to gain altitude and the STRIKE team preps. You can see Rumlow giving you the side-eye and fight the urge to give him a swift kick in the balls. Ever since the holiday party, the scummy asshole has been eye-fucking you and you’re this close to showing him why you’re Romanov’s favorite trainee... _

_ Rogers shifts, drawing your attention back to him, and boy does he resemble nothing in this moment so much as an awkward teenager in a room full of adults.  _

_ The description is hilarious considering he’s taller than anyone on this jet by half a foot and built in a way that makes the STRIKE team look like a bunch of anemics. It’s enough to smooth out the edges of your temper. _

_ “So,” You smile up at him boldly, watch him blink - Jesus Fucking Christ, did they pour the blue from the flag directly into his eyes? - and see Nat grin over his shoulder. Well, more like around his lats. Same difference. “I hear you throw yourself out of planes to avoid Nat's matchmaking. Smart man." _

Everything hurts, and the world is a frozen hell as you drift in and out. There's a hard surface under you, a shadow towering over you, and you're dimly aware of a mechanical humming.

“What the hell is this?” Someone is demanding in tones that clearly shout ‘I’m The Boss’ despite the moderate volume.

“The Asset brought her back with him.” Rumlow’s voice - sandpaper and gravel - scratching at your ears. Please, you beg the universe, _please_ don't let the last thing you hear be that douche canoe's voice...

"And he won't let anyone closer than this?"

"No sir. Not if they're holding a weapon."

A long silence, a considering silence.

“Sir?” Rumlow again. “What do you want us to do?”

“Patch her up. Wipe him. Project Insight is nearly online, and then...then I want to know what’s gotten into him.” Another considering pause. “I want to know everything about her by the time they’re finished wiping him.”

You let the blood loss drag you back under.

_ “No,” Nat wheezes. “Come on, Rogers, even for you…” _

_ Rogers is laughing as he looks at you both. _

_ It’s Thanksgiving and the three of you are sprawled across your living room furniture in various states of food comas. Rogers has been telling you stories of Camp Lehigh, and you can’t help but gape at him a little. _

_ “You jumped on a live grenade?” You repeat. _

_ “It was a dud.” _

_ “But you didn’t know that!” You groan and cover your eyes. “My god, Steve, you really are something else.” _

_ “So you’ll jump on a grenade, and out of a plane, and you’ll put the shield away in the middle of a fight but you won’t go on a date with the cute nurse next door.” Nat pouts. _

_ Steve pulls a face that has you choking on your post-dinner coffee. _

_ “Give the guy a break, Nat.” You say nothing of the long nights where Steve has talked about Peggy, trying to process eighty years of grief in the handful that have passed since he woke up. The ragged edges of Rogers' heart are healing, but it's a slow process, and on this, you and Romanov hold very different schools of thought. _

_ “Yeah,” Steve seconds, reaching for the remaining pumpkin pie and shoveling a forkful directly from the tin to his mouth. “Give me a break.” _

_ Nat shrugs. “I’m just saying. You’re not getting any younger there.” _

_ Steve snorts. “Just because you’re technically older than me doesn’t mean you get to tell me what to do.” _

_ “Uh, that’s exactly what it means.” Nat counters, swinging her legs over the arm of the chair and letting her head fall back the other way. “Besides, you need all the help you can get, Rogers.” _

You come to.

That in and of itself is a pretty big surprise.

You come to and nothing hurts, which is an even bigger surprise, and in fact, you’re feeling pretty comfortable…

Drugs, you realize. Lots of lovely, pain-killing drugs that make worry seem like a distant memory.

“You’re awake.” 

Alexander Pierce.

You sneer at him from the rough cot. “Traitor.”

He doesn’t respond to the insult, gaze cool and calculating. “What did you do to the Asset?”

It takes you a minute. “You mean Barnes?”

Pierce sighs, removes his glasses and begins cleaning them. Looking for all the world like the dignified beacon of American exceptionalism he’s supposed to be. “He’s never gone so off-mission before,” He holds the glasses up to the light, inspecting them. “Which makes you something of a mystery. And I do so hate a mystery. Especially when it slows down my plans.” Those eagle-sharp eyes are back on you now. “So here’s what will happen. You will tell me exactly what transpired between you and the Asset.”

“Or?”

He blinked. “There is no ‘or’, young lady. You will tell me.” He pushes to his feet. “The only question is how much of you will be left when you do.”


	4. Curious Things

The Asset blinks and the Handler smiles. “Welcome back, soldier.”

He says nothing. A response is not required, and he long ago learned to only do what it is required to achieve the mission objective if he didn’t want pain.

Situational awareness is high priority to the objective, and he is already clocking the room. The chair he is in, the restraints that have been released. The techs who look over their shoulders at him with the emotional response his brain classifies as ‘fear’. The S.T.R.I.K.E. team behind the Handler, hands cautiously close to their guns as they watch him. 

And along the far wall, a member of the medical team is working furiously over a body on a cot and something...something keeps his eyes there as the body lets out a soft cry of pain. It scratches along his nerves like jagged glass, and he doesn’t know  _ why _ .

The Handler turns to see what he’s looking at and he’s smiling when he turns back to the Asset. “Report, soldier. Where did you first encounter the target?”

The target. The body? He thinks back, sorting faces and fragments, searching.

“First encountered in pursuit of other targets. Black Widow and Captain…” He trails off, not sure why there is reluctance to name the second target, why the name he has does not seem right when held up to the picture in his mind’s eye of that particular target’s face. “Captain America.”

“Detail exchanges.”

“Confrontation. Asset disabled transport carrying targets. Pursued higher value targets.” He can feel his brow furrowing, smooths it out. The Handler doesn’t like it when he pushes his memories too hard. “Target found when retracing steps after initial objection was unachievable.”

“What did the target say to you?” The Handler repeats the question as the body whimpers again, drawing his attention again. “Asset, what did the target say?”

“‘ James Buchannon Barnes, now I’ve seen every fucking thing’,” He parrots the words in flat tones as he finds the memory. “‘Barnes? Bucky Barnes? End exchange.”

The Handler isn’t happy. “That’s it? That’s all?” He exhales slow, looking back at the body. “Seventy-odd years down the drain because some broad said his fucking name?”

He doesn’t know why, but he says nothing about the man saying his name first - that breathless, shocked ‘Bucky?’ as his face pinched in shock and pain and other emotions that the Asset can’t quite quantify but  _ feels _ like he should be able to. Like there’s something in him that is not functioning optimally, even though a quick scan of his body tells him everything is in working order.

He has a name? The Asset schools his expression as Rumlow and the Handler continue to talk around him. He is the Asset, that’s the only name he’s been allowed other than ‘soldier’. 

But if he has a name, and the body knows his name, does she  _ know him _ ?

The question strikes lightning down his nerve endings and he has to work to keep the tension from showing in his body as the Handler glances back at him.

A flash of memory - warm, soft skin in his arms. Weight, heavy and solid as he carries the body. Fingers, small by comparison to his own, curling into the leather of his jacket as the body - no,  _ woman, _ a part of his brain insists, though he can’t understand the importance of the distinction his mind has created - in his arms whimpers and shifts as he carries her into the vault.

He can still feel the warmth of the woman’s body pressed against his own.

It’s a good feeling.

He wants to feel it again.

He doesn’t realize his hand is hovering over his chest where that warmth resides until he sees the Handler and Rumlow staring at him.

“She’s breaking down the conditioning.” Rumlow states, and the Asset knows that the expression on his face is anger mixed with stubbornness.

How does he know that? That isn’t an emotion he was shown in the training pictures when he was made...And why does he keep superimposing it in his head over the face of the blonde man from earlier today?

His own words echo through his head - ‘Who the hell is Bucky?’

Then again, as the woman, slumped and bleeding out and looking up at him with wonder and a tired kind of surprise - ‘I’m Bucky?’

He’s Bucky.

He rolls the name around the inside of his head like a marble, gaining speed and weight. It  _ feels _ right, even if he doesn’t know why. Or what a Bucky is, what meaning this label holds to provoke these responses from the blonde man and the hurt woman and the Handler, who is looking at him like he’s done something interesting and he realizes he’s been staring into space while his hand rubs over his heart.

Another cry from the woman on the cot has all of them looking over as the doctor swears and grabs at his hand.

“She fucking bit me!” The doctor moves with violence towards the woman whose teeth are bared in a bloody, feral smile and the Asset moves before he has made a decision to.

It’s simple, he rationalizes as he finds his hand closing around the doctor’s throat. If he is Bucky, and the woman knows him, he needs the woman so he can find out what a Bucky  _ is. _

“Easy now,” The Handler says. “Asset. Release the doctor.”

The S.T.R.I.K.E team are holding their guns, trained on him and the doctor is turning cheerful shades of red under his grip and the woman on the cot is staring at him with that mix of emotions that churns up his own feelings.

He releases the doctor, who scrambles away as quickly as possible. His chest...his chest is heaving and his pulse is racing.

He shuts his eyes, tightly, and begins to bring his body back under control.

“I think,” The Handler says in soft tones. “This is going to be very interesting.”

“You should decommission him.” Rumlow argues, and the Asset opens his eyes to see you glaring at the team leader. “He’s too dangerous if the conditioning is no longer holding.”

Rumlow isn’t wrong - he is dangerous.

Dangerously close to  _ wanting _ something he doesn’t have words for.

He glances down at the woman - you - and before he’s made the conscious decision to open his mouth, asks the question as if it had just been waiting to fall out.

“Do you know who I am?”


	5. Triskelion Falls

Rumlow comes through the doors and Sam takes no small amount of joy in hammering his fist into the asshole’s head, sinking the full weight of his body behind the punch with that oh-so-satisfying momentum as his hand makes the connection, and then they're off to the races, trading blows and blocks in near-equal measure.

When they break apart - Sam hitting the floor and knowing he’s gonna feel that headbutt tomorrow - Rumlow grins. The man is nine kinds of crazy.

“This is gonna hurt,” He promises, and Sam sees the light of a fucking fanatic in those eyes.

“You talk too damn much.” Sam swears, pushing to his feet.

Rumlow’s grin goes sharp and feral. “Not nearly as much as your friend, y/n.”

“ _ What did he just say? _ ” Fury and Steve’s voices ring in his ear near simultaneously.

“You’re full of shit.” Sam grunts as they close again, and for a few sweet seconds, there’s only the sound of strikes and blows and pained grunts as they land.

Rumlow laughs when they break this time. “Oh, Cap’s girl talked. Of course, after the interrogation Pierce put her through, I think she would have said just about anything to make the pain stop.”

Sam feels a wave of fury for you. He hadn’t had a chance to get to know you really, but he’d seen you with Nat and Steve at his house and it was clear that you were - despite all differences - cut from the same kind of cloth. A family of outcasts trying to do the right thing.

He sees you for a second, gut shot and solemn, grenades in hand as he walked away.

He left you there.

And if Rumlow  _ isn’t _ lying, he left you there for Hydra to pick apart.

The guilt almost causes him to take a knee to the face, and Sam puts his focus back on where it belongs, right here and now.

“Oh yeah,” Rumlow’s amusement continues as they circle. “But then, I guess Cap knows just how much of a screamer y/n was, doesn’t he?”

“Man, shut the hell up already.” Sam says as Steve’s voice in his ear promises Rumlow a slow death.

For all the crazy, Rumlow is good at what he does, and he manages to throw Sam through a desk partition a moment later.

Shaking off the glass, Sam stares up at him.

“You’re outta your depth, kid.”

The sound of shattering glass has Rumlow looking back as the first carrier crashes into the building and Sam is up and running like he has never run in his life before. There's no time for satisfaction as the debris swallows Rumlow with a scream of metal.

“Please tell me you got that chopper in the air,” He pants into the mic. 

“Sam,” Nat’s voice comes through loud and clear. “Where are you?”

He barely dodges a concrete chunk the size of a tree. “Forty-first floor, northwest corner.”

“We’re on the way. Stay where you are.”

Ha! “Not an option!” 

He’s running out of space to run, the glass windows ahead looming even as he spots the chopper.

Aw, man. He really doesn’t like where this is going, but there really isn’t anything else to do...

He crashes through the window, has time to see Nicholas J. Fury’s ‘oh shit’ face as the helicopter angles and he tucks, hoping to god and anyone else who might be listening he didn’t just commit suicide by gravity and helicopter.

Nat snags him as he slides through the belly of the chopper and the relief is  _ unreal _ as the chopper rights itself.

“Forty first floor! Forty  _ first _ !”


	6. Mission Objectives

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A/N: Well this thing is just ripping right along...Don't mind me - just procrastinating on my grad school applications...

They’d wiped him again before they sent him back out, but it’s different this time. He can  _ tell _ now that his responses are stunted, colorless, emotionless. Hollowed out, and he senses that it should bother him - that if he was in his right mind, it would bother him.

It should bother him more that he is using these words, even if only inside his own head. They hold no value to the objective. They will not help him end The Mission.

He can still remember you - your face, looking up at him, voice saying...he can’t recall the words, but there’s a weight in his chest that tells him the words matter, if only he could reach them somehow...instead, his head is pounding and his gut feels like it's twisting and he feels as if he has stepped onto solid ground to find an ice slick under his feet instead.

He remembers the feeling of your body in his arms, and the look on The Mission’s face from the day before, and the weight of a name that barely brushes along the edges of his subconscious.

It makes him uncertain in the fight against The Mission, who isn’t even wearing a proper tactical outfit but some kind of costume that won’t even deflect the most rudimentary of blades. He is sloppy, and he takes more hits than he should, and the Asset feels  _ something  _ boiling hot surge within him as the man who is The Mission drops the shield - the only decent weapon on him -and tells him he won’t fight.

And he doesn’t, not even as the Asset pummels him beneath his fist, shouting words he doesn’t understand because the words of The Mission are doing something to the numb fog that surrounds him. His brain is bleeding with words and images he can’t make sense of.

_ A small, sickly version of the man beneath him, shy grin and resigned smile. _

_ Your hand, clutching at the leather of his jacket. _

_ Losing a poker game in the woods in France with more faces he doesn’t know. _

_ An older woman, teasing a younger one while another shares a smile with him around a table that is worn and barely standing but clean. _

_ “..With ya til the end of the line.”  _ The past and the present converge in one moment of blinding, sickening clarity and for a second - one short, firefly second - Bucky Barnes stares down at Steve Rogers in horror and shock.

And then the glass of the carrier drops out from beneath him, and the Asset is holding to the beam above him, watching the Mission fall into the water below, the words still circling in his mind as the memories recede into the fog of the past.

Til the end of the line…

End of the line…

And the Asset lets go, following the Mission down into the depths of the river.

He saved the Mission. Left him coughing dirty river water on the bank, beaten bloody but alive. He watched as first responders found the Mission, took him away in an ambulance. He trailed it to the hospital, needing….needing to be sure that the Mission - the man - would survive. Only then did he stop, sinking down behind the dumpster of the diner next to the hospital.

The Handler was gone.

The Mission was protected.

He had no objective any more, and no Handler to direct him.

A flash of sense-memory again - a soft, warm body. A face that looked at him - your face- with emotions he couldn’t name. A cry of pain. The vault, and a doctor moving to strike you.

Objective acquired, he realized, standing back up.

The Mis- the man, he corrected - was secure. The man who called him a name and started this was safe, but the woman who called him the name and told him things about himself was not safe. 

The Asset would not be able to get close to the man - not easily, and not for a long time. That left him with only the woman. If something happened to her, he might never find out what he was supposed to be. Might never be able to pierce together the pieces he could feel beginning to shift inside him.

The woman was not safe at the vault, he remembered. It was not a secure location.

You were not safe.

Not yet.


	7. Ghosts & Graveyards

The cemetery is peaceful when Steve can finally get there. A quiet, wooded place with blooming summer flowers and butterflies on a hill that rolls away from the city. Your will contained all the information about your pre-purchased lot, and your lawyer made all the arrangements, so at least Steve knows you would’ve liked it.

Sam comes with him, and honestly, he’s grateful for the company since he and Nat can barely look at each other right now. The inside of his head isn’t a place he should be left alone in right now, and he thinks Sam knows that.

Hydra is exposed but not gone, and Bucky is out there somewhere, alive, thinking and feeling god-only-knows. The  _ need _ to find out what happened to him is eating him alive, right alongside the guilt over your death.

His eyes drift to the simple raised marker with your name carved in it at his feet.

Rollins had confirmed it when Hill interrogated him after the fall of the Triskelion - Hydra had tortured you for information, then killed you. There wasn’t even a body left to bury in the ground under the marker - just a graveside memorial service of people you’d saved and worked alongside, pouring out your favorite booze from the bottle over this little patch of grass.

Was this all he had to offer anyone who became his friend? An early death, and a lifetime of memories tainted by guilt and grief stretching out in front of him for...for however long the serum kept him alive?

_ Stop being such a drama queen, Rogers _ .

Your voice played in his head, as if you were standing next to him. Hell, maybe you were - gods were real so why not ghosts too? It certainly would explain the feeling of being watched that was a near constant itch between his shoulder blades these days.

_ It’s only paranoia if they  _ aren’t  _ out to get you _ , Ghost-You whispers in his ear.

“Did she have any family?” Sam asks.

Steve shakes his head. “No. She and Nat...they used to joke that the Avengers was all the family drama they needed.” It  _ hurts _ to remember you like that, carefree and quippy on the high of post-mission success. The way you’d ruffled his hair when the adrenaline came down and left him crashing on your couch, head pillowed on your legs while Nat tossed goldfish into your open mouth...

Sam snorts, soft. “You all do seem to have a lot going on.” He glances around. “As resting places go, it’s a nice one. Peaceful.”

“Yeah.” He suddenly hates it, hands clenching. Peaceful, he scoffs, was never your style. The only time he saw you peaceful was in battle, when the fight became a dance and you gave yourself over to it, no thinking, no hesitation. Even in sleep you were restless, but not in the heart of combat. There...there you were steady, even while the storm raged around you.

Maybe, he thinks, and feels the tension drain from him like a balloon - all in a rush - maybe that’s why you picked this place. To give yourself the thing you never seemed to find when the bullets stopped flying.

He won’t be able to come back here. Not for a long time. You’ve left a wound in him, and it’s going to be a bitch, waiting for it to scab over enough to see that pretty, pale marble with your name lasered into it. So he makes himself look, and look hard, at it one last time. Searing it into his mind with that damned eidetic memory so that when he  _ is _ ready, it’ll be there waiting.

And then he turns away and they head back to Sam’s car, a newer model to replace the one the Winter Soldier - Bucky - destroyed.

“You're going after him?”

There’s only one ‘him’ Sam could possibly be talking about. “You don't have to come with me.”

“I know.” Sam shrugs, as if to say ‘so what’. “When do we start?”


	8. AOU: The Interlude

“Sounds like a helluva fight,” Sam says as they move towards the stairs, having just cleaned Steve out at the pool table to the cackling delight of the Vets that Tony had invited. “Sorry I missed it.”

“If I’d known it was going to be a firefight I absolutely would have called.” Steve promises, and wonders again if he shouldn’t be pushing Sam so hard to find Bucky. They could use the Falcon more - hell, they could use a whole 'nother team at times. The world is a dangerous place, and the Avengers can't be everywhere at once.

Steve misses the time when the weirdest thing science had made was him.

It’s been over a year, and he’s no closer to finding out what happened to his best friend after the Triskelion. Whispers, rumors, false leads...The only thing they know that they didn’t before is what Hydra had in their files, and  _ that _ knowledge keeps him up most nights.

“No, no, I’m not actually sorry.” Sam confesses as they reach the railing of the balcony. “I’m perfectly happy chasing down cold leads on our missing persons case. Avenging is your world. And your world is crazy.”

“This last lead…”

“Nah,” Sam shakes his head and takes a sip of the beer in his hand. “By the time I got there, it was too late. Turned out not to be a match - it was a couple, not a man, and the surveillance footage was too spotty to I.D. him.”

Some restless instinct shifts inside him at Sam’s words. “A couple?”

“Yeah.” Sam scoffs. “A man and a woman, out of Atlanta, headed for Vienna. The dude was definitely military of some flavor - built like a brick shit house, so he could have been our guy. But there was a woman with him, and the footage we did get...well, I don’t think our amnesiac is gonna be big on displays of public affection, y’know?”

Nat’s words slide through his mind, ' _ public displays of affection make people uncomfortable' _ .

“He could be working with someone.”

Sam shrugs. “Sure. He could. And I imagine he has a fair amount of his own contacts helping him out. I just think...I think our boy’s brains may be a little too scrambled for that kind of byplay.”

Yeah. Steve shakes the lingering feeling that he's missed something. Sam's probably right. The Bucky he'd seen - even briefly - had been stripped, turned into a weapon. A blunt object that Hydra used to hammer their enemies into submission.

Steve doesn’t want to admit it, but as time goes on, he’s losing faith in the idea that Bucky - the Bucky he knew, the Bucky he would swear he saw on the helicarrier - is ever coming back.

Still, he owes it to him to try.

“Come on,” He claps his hand on Sam’s shoulder. “Let me introduce you to Thor.”


	9. Bucharest

“Our boy’s got himself a comfy little nest.” Sam passes him the binoculars and Steve focuses them on the apartment across the street.

They’ve done it - they’ve found Bucky. Finally.

And they’re a day or so ahead of the U.N.’s team thanks to Sharon Carter’s help, offered with a steel-backed spine and an irritatingly sympathetic glance. 

He'd take it though, gritting his teeth the whole time. He'd take help from the devil himself for Bucky, so what's a little pity?

There’s a chance - a chance - he can bring him in before the kill squad gets here.

Bucky’s standing at the stove, back turned to the partially pulled curtains. Cooking. It’s...domestic...and it throws Steve more than he’d like to admit.

“Parabolic mic coming online in three..two..one..” 

The speaker starts to play the faint strains of music that immediately pulls Steve back to New York - 1930’s New York - and nights trailing behind Bucky and whatever doll of the week he was chasing.

God, they were so _young_ then _._ He has to swallow past the lump blocking his airway.

How many times has he wished for  _ that _ Bucky to be back? Cocky, sure of himself. A devil on the dance floor. Curious as sin about science and the future and technology...Exasperated with Steve and the numerous back-alley fights and scrapes...

He would give up the shield, avenging, all of it. In a heartbeat.

But he doesn’t have to because as he watches, heart in his throat, and Ella Fitzgerald crooning about dancing cheek to cheek, Bucky Barnes is swaying side to side, and even though Steve can’t see his face, he can see the loose-limbed ease in Buck’s body.

“Shit.” Sam curses as the speaker dies. “Well, so much for that plan.”

Steve barely hears it because Bucky moves to the side, reaching for something on a shelf out of his line of sight to reveal a woman standing at the stove, stirring something slowly, calling something over her shoulder and as Bucky turns, Steve can see the massive, easy smile curling his friend’s lips upwards.

Bucky takes the woman’s hand and draws her towards him in a move straight out of the James Buchannon Barnes playbook as they move out of sight.

“Our boy’s got some game.” 

“Yeah.” Steve has to clear his throat and blink a couple of times as he puts the binoculars down. “Yeah, he always did.”

The guilt and exhaustion catch him at the same time, because whatever peace Bucky Barnes has found for himself here in Bucharest, it’s about to vanish, and if Steve doesn’t want to lose him for good, he’s the one who’s going to ruin that easy smile by showing up at his door.

“Give him the night. We’ll give ‘em the night.” He makes it sound like it’s a gift to Bucky, but the truth is, he selfishly wants just a little more time before he has to knock on Bucky’s door.


	10. Sketches and Specters

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> a/n: As always, thanks for reading! This is a much better outlet than staring at my 'statement of purpose' waiting for inspiration to strike 😆
> 
> All of my angst is getting pushed out via this, so sorry/not sorry?

“I never wanted to know that super soldier stamina translated  _ off _ the battlefield.” Sam is bitching in Steve’s ear and he can’t exactly blame Wilson as he hustles up to the now-empty apartment. The parabolic mic had gone in and out most of the evening, but there’d been enough coming through to make both of them flush when they realized what exactly they’d been eavesdropping on.

“Seriously.” Sam’s bitching continues as Steve lets himself in. “Your boy is nasty, Cap.”

Steve can’t fight the wince, because, okay, yeah - that wasn’t exactly what he’d call a good time, and while he’s not half the prude people seem to paint him as, listening to your best friend fuck someone was a bit...voyeuristic. 

He felt like a pervy peeping tom.

Of course, breaking and entering into Bucky’s apartment is really helping that feeling.  _ Not _ .

There’s an oddness in the air - the feel - of the place that he can’t quite put his finger on as he enters the single room dwelling. 

He’s not sure what he should’ve been expecting from a fugitive amnesiac who's spent the last eighty-odd years being a ruthless killer for an organization bent on world domination.

But this space doesn’t feel temporary, for all it’s bareness.

The mattress - he is  _ never  _ going to be able to un-hear those springs- is on the floor, but it’s mounded with textured, soft blankets, half-made in that messy way Steve remembers from sharing that apartment in Brooklyn.

‘ _ What’s the point in makin’ it, Stevie, if it’s just gonna get messed up again?’ _

There’s a chipped mug of coffee, half-drunk and forgotten on the edge of the sink and a match for it on the counter, holding a wildflower riot in a small bouquet. For the umpteenth time, his chest tightens. Signs of a life…

A day ago he would’ve given anything to have Bucky back. To have been standing here, to see him.

Now...looking at the two candy bars - Bucky’s favorite and a bar of dark, bitter chocolate - on top of the small fridge, along with a journal with a well-cracked spine...now, he’d trade anything to not have to be here. To not be Bucky’s best bet of survival.

The journal is in his hands before he even made the decision to pick it up, and he’s cracked it open even as Sam revises Bucky’s ETA.

Most of it’s in languages he can’t read - there’s definitely Russian, something that vaguely resembles Spanish - but there are sketches too. People, places, things. Most of them are done in hurried pencil, as if Bucky had drawn them quickly, and Steve wonders if he does them fast because he’s afraid he won’t remember them.

And then he’s staring at his own face on the page - his  _ real _ face, the one before the war and Erskine - and his heart seems to stop in his chest.

_ Bucky remembers him. _

He turns the page and forgets to breathe.

You.

It’s you.

Done in a quick profile, lashes lowered, lips parted. Sleeping? Dead?

He turns the page to run away from you but you’re on all of them. Scribbled in corners, etched halfway down a page. Hair sprawled over your shoulder and the tattoo inked there; Face flashing fire, lips curled back in a snarl; Perched in on an invisible ledge, one leg dangling as your hands balanced a mug on your thigh. Quick character studies on the page, capturing your every emotion and his hands are shaking as he turns to the page again to see you drawn slumped against a wall, hand holding your stomach, face a mask of pain with Bucky’s heavy scrawl asking in block letters ‘WHY CAN’T I REMEMBER HER?’

Bucky’s trying to remember  _ you _ \- a woman Hydra most likely made him kill.

“He’s on his way back. Looks spooked, Steve.”

He might as well have put roots down into the floor. He’d have a better chance at moving if he had - struck dumb with too much feeling in his chest that has him sucking in air like he hasn’t since he was an asthmatic.

“Steve? Steve, do you copy?”

Movement. Movement as the blankets on the mattress shift.

Jesus, Bucky’s lover.

They’d just...assumed she’d left with Buck.

Christ.

Even as he brings his breathing under control, Steve can’t help but feel sorry for the shit-show that’s about to drop into this poor woman’s life.

The covers move lower as she rolls over, grumbling low, but he can’t discern the words as his brain screeches to a halt. He can actually hear the record scratch of his mind skipping tracks. Sam’s voice is in his ear, but he can’t hear a word as your face blinks up at him sleepily.

“Y/n?” The world is spinning as your eyes begin to clear and focus and he has to brace himself on the counter.

“Steve?”


	11. Epiphanies, P1

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> a/n: Sorry to leave y'all with this mini cliff hanger for the weekend!

“Steve?” 

They’ve found you. _ Finally _ . The relief that sweeps through you is better than any adrenaline high you’ve ever faced as an Avenger.

You’re going to go  _ home. _

“Took you long enough, you fucking punk.” Oh, god, your eyes are watering and you blink back tears as you take in the sight of him, new suit and all.

“You’re alive.” He’s pale as a sheet under the cowl, eyes wide and shock-filled as you reach for yesterday’s dress, drag it on under the cover of blankets as he glances away. “Jesus, you’ve been...you’ve been...this whole time?”

You shove the blankets aside and roll to your feet. What did - understanding slammed into you like a freight train. “You thought I was  _ dead _ …But then...what are you doing-” Your second epiphany of the morning slams into you with no less force than the first. “You were looking for  _ him.” _

They thought you were  _ dead _ . They hadn’t been looking for you at all.

When you get out of here, when you have time to absorb that, it’s going to hurt, but you push it down, bury it ruthlessly. The way you'd buried everything over the last two years, just trying to survive, trying to hold on to your sanity and your sense of self and whatever else you could.

“You’re not dead.” Any other time, it’d be funny, watching Steve gape at you.

“Surprise?” You try weakly and his bark of broken laughter echoes through the apartment, and it's the best sound you've heard in too long. “Now help me get this fucking thing off.” You shake your leg to draw attention to the thin chain wrapped around your ankle, looped around the radiator. "

“What the hell…”

“I’ll explain many miles and several drinks from here, Rogers.” You promise, and you might even kind of mean it. Though ‘several’ will mean ‘a lot’, as in 'metric shit ton'. “Just get me the fuck out of here before he comes back.”

"Bucky did this?" Steve strikes at the chain with the edge of his shield, crouches down and rips the loop from your ankle. "He's not...he's not brainwashed by Hydra?"

You wish you could spare him this heartbreak, because you can read the hope written across his face. The best you can do is a soft, "It's more complicated, Steve."

“INCOMING.” You hear the squawk in Steve’s earpiece and he winces at the volume as you hear the keys sliding home in the lock of the door.

And then Bucky Barnes steps into the apartment, drawing up short at the sight of Steve, still crouched near your leg, hands a breath away from your skin.

Fuck a duck.


	12. Epiphanies, P2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> a/n: Ah, that moment when you just can't make yourself face the workday so you write another chpt over your coffee

For a minute, you think Bucky might actually attack Steve.

But between one breath and the next, he draws on that indomitable willpower of his and shuts the door behind him. There’s still worrying amounts of tension in his jaw, the set of his shoulders, the clench of his fists. But there’s a chance now...

“Do you know me?” Steve is oblivious to the danger as he stands and Bucky steps further into the apartment, but you’re not, and the shiver that runs through you doesn’t go unnoticed by Bucky, who’s eyes darken as they land on you.

It’s reflex to move away from Steve to put distance between you and any man that isn’t Bucky. It goes unnoticed by Steve, given that he’s staring at Bucky, waiting for an answer.

“You're Steve. I read about you in a museum.” Bucky moves closer, body language deceptively nervous.

He’s a master at a lot of things - killing people, languages,  _ cooking _ for Christ’s sake- but lying? Bucky Barnes is one of the most phenomenal liars you’ve ever met. Even Romanov pales in comparison. Right now he doesn't look like the man who’s held you captive for the last two years. He looks like a spooked cat, waiting to decide if he’s going to run or claw Steve. He’s read the hope in Steve’s face and he’s playing into it.

“I know you're nervous.” Steve backs up, giving him space. Hands open at his sides. “And you have plenty of reason to be. But you're lying.”

Yes, yes he is.

Bucky Barnes has had most of his memories for the last year- he absolutely remembers Steve, remembers the war. Remembers everything Hydra made him do. He isn’t fully James Buchannon Barnes, but he’s a long ways from the Winter Soldier, the Asset. A Frankenstein's monster made up of different men's minds instead of limbs.

“I wasn't in Vienna. I don't do that anymore.”

_ Wait,  _ you think, what the hell happened in Vienna?

Steve’s backed up to the counter now, Bucky standing nearly next to you, and with a small shift of that massive body, he’s between you and Steve, blocking you from Steve’s view. A small portion of tension releases from his shoulders.

“Well, the people who think you did are coming here  _ now _ . And they're not planning on taking you alive.”

“That's smart. Good strategy.” You wonder if Steve can see the wheels turning, because despite the resignation in his voice, the man you’ve spent the last two years with has no intention of going down. Period.

There’s the familiar thud of combat boots coming from the stairwell, indicating that you're almost out of time.

“This doesn't have to end in a fight, Buck.”

_ Oh, Rogers _ , you think as the rest of pieces fit together,  _ you big soft-hearted idiot _ . Something happened in Vienna, something they’re pinning on Bucky. And Steve Rogers is here trying to save the life of his best friend, trying to (as always) do the right thing in a world where the right thing is as clear as mud.

“It always ends in a fight.” Bucky says, taking off the black gloves he uses to hide his metal hand when he leaves the apartment.

“You pulled me from the river. Why?” There’s temper and impatience in the question and you realize Steve might not be quite so blind to Bucky’s act after all.

“I don't know.”

“Yes, you _do_.” There’s anger in Steve’s voice at the denial.

And that’s when a grenade comes flying through the window.


	13. Old Patterns

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> a/n: tried to keep it fairly tight to canon, but had to take some liberties

_ And that’s when a grenade comes flying through the window. _

Separated by time, circumstances - fucking  _ brainwashing and memory wipes _ \- and it takes exactly two seconds for Barnes and Rogers to fall back into partnership in the face of adversity.

You’re not even sure either one of them made a conscious decision - they move together in tandem as if they’re psychic as Steve deflects the first grenade and Bucky punts the second one to Steve without looking as Steve shoves the shield down over top it, containing the blast.

And then Bucky pulls you behind him, lifts the mattress to block the shots coming in from the window even as soldiers outside ram the door.

“Schieß die Tür auf!”  _ Shoot the door! _

Bucky’s already moving again, throwing the table as a makeshift barricade against the door as more operatives - GSG 9 by the look of their gear - rappel in through the windows and you move your back to the wall, out of the way of all parties.

Steve pulls the rug from under a policeman, sending him flying and Bucky slams another policeman into the wall, and it’s smooth as goddamn silk as they both face the operative coming in through the back door, Steve setting him up so Bucky can kick him with superhuman strength from the building.

**“** Buck, stop!” Steve pulls him back when he makes a move to follow through, and Bucky spins into the hold to break it. “You're gonna kill someone.”

Bucky slams Steve down onto the floor and you wince - because that’s definitely gotta hurt - and then Bucky’s fist is drawing back and you can see Steve’s eyes widen as his best friend drives it downwards.

And smashes into the compartment where he’s hidden his go-bag.

**“** I'm not gonna kill anyone.”  _ Idiot _ , the tone adds as Bucky stands, tosses the backpack through the window, even as another operative is coming through the window, and Steve is back on his feet, pulling Bucky behind the shield to deflect the gunfire and you slip behind the mattress to avoid the ricochet.

Bucky shoves Steve towards the window where another soldier is taking up position and you watch Steve go through the window, hear the sounds of the fight ensuing on the little balcony. And then Bucky turns his attention to the GSG-9 soldier who has the misfortune of being between him and you.

The look he turns on the soldier is no mask, no act - just the icy, relentless focus of the Winter Soldier - as he stalks forward, using the metal hand to deflect the near-point-blank shots before swinging the man into the wall and down through the bookshelf as one of his buddies pushes to his feet in time to receive a backhanded cinder block that punches him through the bathroom door.

There’s three quick rounds as the unit in the stairwell decides they want in on the action. Now.

“Time to go, doll.” He closes one hand around your arm, half-shielding you with his body as he makes for the door, even as you hear Steve call for you both.

Your shout of “Steve!” is lost as Bucky punches through the wall next to the door, then through the door and it’s a blur of well-choreographed violence as he ruthlessly clears the landing.

You’ve spent too much of your life as a tactical operative to not appreciate it - appreciate  _ him _ . Aside from Nat, you’ve never seen anyone move with that particular combination of malevolent violence and self-assured grace. It’s a little fucked up, but it’s...well, it's still beautiful.  Even as he leaps half a level down and begins clearing it, every move is measured, and thought out at least two moves in advance.

“Der Verdächtige ist ausgebrochen. Er ist am östlichen Treppenschacht.” _ Suspect has broken containment! He's headed down the east stairwell! _

Steve pauses as he takes in the sight of you, before he grabs the radio and crushes it. “Are you-”

“Go!” You tell him, because no way does Steve Rogers fly halfway around the world to protect his best friend just to lose him now. Besides, you might be good - you’re not good enough to keep up with those two though. So instead you watch Steve follow Bucky.

Huh, you think as you sink against the wall. That’s a role reversal.

Bucky manages to toss one of the soldiers over the railing and Steve catches him, stopping him from falling. He looks at Bucky wearily.  **“** Come on, man.”

And you swear you see a teeth-baring grin from Bucky Barnes before he glances back up at you. You can see the calculation, see how much he doesn’t like it as his jaw fixes to set itself stubborn and he makes half a step in your - Steve’s - direction.

Gunfire below draws both their attention and you feel relief as you hear more soldiers entering the apartment behind you. You slowly raise your hands and as the first one sweeps out of the apartment, say, “I’d like to surrender now.”


	14. A Fixed Point

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> a/n: Work is hell this week and this is how I'm coping 🙃

“Take her to debrief.” The man in the suit orders as the soldiers escort you from the vehicle.

Steve and Sam are a couple steps behind you, along with a man everyone keeps referring to as ‘highness’ and who Sam seems to be convinced is some kind of furry…

“Hey! Wait just a goddamn min-” Steve’s protest is shushed by another agent as you’re led away. “Where the hell are you taking her?”

They escort you to an interrogation room, and since you’re left uncuffed, you’re guessing it’s under surveillance.

Five minutes later and the door opens.

It’s Nat, and there’s a half-second when she steps in the room and you can see walls the Widow keeps around herself crumble before she stumbles to you, dragging you into a hug as she buries her face in your shoulder and sobs, shaking. You feel your own face wet with tears, and oh, god this...you shut your eyes tight and cling to the feeling of family after the last two years.

When you pull away you give each other a minute to wipe at your eyes and then she’s looking you over.

“What in the hell are you wearing?”

You grimace and glance down at the faded, soft cut dress. “Not my choice. I’ll explain later.”

“This whole time…”

You nod, because there isn’t anything to say to that half-question, half-hating statement. 

“They’re going to have some psychologist come in and talk to you. They brought him in for Barnes, but I guess the containment pod has to take a different route through the building and it’ll be a while.”

“Nat,” You admonish. “You’re not supposed to be telling me that, I’m pretty sure.”

One shoulder lifts in a gallic shrug as she sits on the edge of the table and bats her eyes at you in mock innocence. “I’m just in shock - you’re back from the dead. Anyone might casually let something slip.” It slips away too soon, the playful look on her face. “What the hell happened to you? Why didn’t you contact us? Why didn’t you find a way to let us know you were alive?”

“I- I- Nat, I swear, I tried. I swear it.” How do you make her understand in the few minutes you have before this psychologist shows up? “I can’t...There isn’t…”

The door opens and a mild-faced man enters the room.

“Agent Romanov, if you please?” His voice is lightly accented, and almost musical, but leaves no room for argument. 

“I’ll be right outside.” 

You nod, and watch her walk out as the man - the psychologist - takes a seat and gestures for you to do the same.

“I’d rather stand, if you don’t mind.”

“You don’t like being confined, do you, agent y/f/n y/l/n?”

You blink at him. “A little direct for a psychologist, aren’t you?”

He smiles, and there’s something...off...about it. Slick around the edges somehow. “I see no reason to...how would you say…’beat around the bush’, with an agent of your pre-emptively posthumous caliber. Congratulations on your miraculous resurrection.”

Yes. There is definitely something  _ not right _ about this. Every instinct is humming under your skin, an itch you can’t scratch. You know spectacular liars - this man is good, but not  _ that _ good.

“So what do you want to know?” You rub your arms, play acting at uncertainty by adding a slight tremor to your voice. You’ll bite. See where this is going.

Not once does that amicable smile fade from his face as he takes out a tablet and reviews something on it - your file? Most likely - in a picture of absentminded scholarliness. “Tell me about what happened in D.C.”

Your pulse spikes and your hands turn clammy. “I got gut-shot under the overpass.”

“And then? The Winter Soldier and Hydra found you?”

“Barnes did.” It’s easier to refer to him by last name, to put that distance there. Bucky is the man Steve is trying to save, and a third of the man you’ve spent the last twenty four months with, and it seems too...intimate...for this conversation. “He brought me to Hydra. And less than a day later...the Triskelion fell.”

“And what was happening for you as the Triskelion fell?”

You shrug. “Honestly, it’s a blur of drugs and pain - I got shot.”

“And Hydra just...stitched you up?”

“They kept me from bleeding out. Gave me just enough painkillers to be able to form words. Interrogated me, just a little.” You aren’t lying when you say most of it’s a blur - you can barely remember your initial capture. “They were a little preoccupied with Project Insight at the time.”

“Yet here you are. Not a prisoner of Hydra, and looking remarkably well for a dead woman. Curious, no? Tell me how you came to be in the company of James Buchannon Barnes.”

Aaand there it is - his real interest. Betrayed by the slight shift in his chair, the narrowing of his eyes. The man in front of you is a professional, but not a professional psychologist, and he wants Bucky Barnes for reasons as yet unknown.

“Two years is a long time, y/n.”

“Barnes - the Winter Soldier,” You correct, because  _ that _ is who came back to you at the vault, who held the medical team hostage for as long as it took for you to heal, even while the beginnings of Bucky Barnes was stirring in his mind. “He came back to the vault. Made them finish fixing me up. Spent a couple of weeks there, just healing.” You’d been certain you wouldn’t survive those early days as Barnes’ psyche had begun to shatter the conditioning Hydra had put him through. It had been like watching a kaleidoscope of personality, memories, twisting and blending in unpredictable ways, shattering in others. ‘Volatile’ didn’t even begin to cover it.

Just thinking about it makes your stomach twist.

“And after that? He didn’t kill you, or let you go, and now here we are - where you have been found in the company of a terrorist.” Those eyes sharpen on you for a moment. “Are you telling me you weren’t there willingly?”

“I think the fact that I had a chain around my leg is a pretty good answer to that.”

“So, a highly trained operative - so good that the intelligence community could not even agree if he  _ existed _ \- just decided on a whim to take you with him while he...backpacked through Europe?”

Oh yeah, your instincts and experience tell you - he’s definitely military under the act he’s wearing right now and he is here with some kind of agenda. You hope like hell Nat’s watching, seeing what you’re seeing.

“Yes.”

“Why?” Now he’s looking at you, really looking, like a bug under a microscope. This man’s interests begin and end with Barnes, but that gaze...you shiver. “Why you? What purpose did your presence serve?”

“You’ll have to ask him that.”

“Oh,” He says, all jovial smiles again. “I plan to. But I would welcome your perceptions. I would think you would be eager to help us - if you were in fact a prisoner.”

Definitely a soldier, not a spy, you think. That line of thinking is too linear for an agent of espionage, and now you’re left trying to think how best to respond, without giving away an ounce of information more than you need to.

“My best guess?”

The so-called-psychologist nods. “Please.”

“I called him Bucky. When I was shot. I think it…well, I think it stuck, when his conditioning started to break down.” You learned long ago -before you'd ever even heard of the Avengers - that telling as much of the truth as possible is the best way to lie to someone. This truth costs you nothing to tell.

“Like an imprint. A duckling?”

It’s accurate enough as descriptions go, if ducklings received tactical training, superhuman strength, and had the temperament of a tripwire in an earthquake. 

“Yes.” The rush of the last few hours is starting to wear off, so you sit down before you fall down. “It’s...he fixated on me. Because I said his name - his real name.” You let your mind drift back, exhaustion beginning to creep forward more readily now. “I think...I think he thinks he knew me, before. I think…”

“He used you as a linchpin to recovering his lost identity - a fixed point? A lode stone to navigate the reassembly of a fractured psyche?”

You can’t quite hide the tension in your shrug. “You’d know better than me, doc.”

“Fascinating.” At your raised eyebrows he apologizes. “That was rude of me.” His gaze turns even more apologetic. “I have to ask you to tell me more about your time with him, y/n. To debrief you, and ascertain whether or not you can be released on your own recognizance.”

Now you let out a little laugh, and when he quirks an eyebrow at you you shake your head. “C’mon, Doc. You and I both know the best I can hope for is comfortable custody until someone way above either of our paygrades makes a decision. You want to hear about how Barnes kept me a prisoner for the last two years, great. Anytime I wasn’t literally chained up or contained, he held the threat of my fam- my friends’ lives over my head and a knife to a major organ.” Anger, helplessness...you shove it all back, shut your eyes and take a couple deep breaths. “And the times I tried...tried to contact anyone…” You won’t give this charlatan a moment of those horrible interludes. “Well. Hydra taught him cruelty very well, and let’s leave it at that.”

“You’ve been through a lot.” His stare has weight and you realize he’s looking right through the walls you’ve pulled around yourself. Maybe he really is a head-shrinker after all. “You have suffered, haven’t you?”

The door opens and the suit pokes his head in. “We’re ready for you, Doc.” His eyes drift to you, then back to the ‘good doctor’. “How are we in here?”

“It is my professional recommendation that legal action not be pursued against agent y/l/n at this time.” He stands, pushes back from the table. “Though I would be remiss if I didn’t strongly recommend counseling, and a more thorough debrief under more...comfortable...circumstances. Agent y/l/n,” He tips an imaginary hat to you and moves into the hallway.

The suit - Everett Ross - assigns you an escort. You don’t have to fake the gratitude in your voice when he leads you to a women’s locker room, where Nat is waiting with a bag from the local pharmacy and a clean set of clothes.

“The doc,” You start. “You need to watch-”

Ross shakes his head. “Y/n, I think you’ve been through enough in the last few hours. Agent Romanov has been cleared to spend time with you while we have Barnes observed. You’ll be home on a flight tomorrow, back to the states, where you will undergo a formal debrief process, and be evaluated more fully.”

“He’s really competent.” Nat assures you as he walks away, and she tugs you into the locker room. “A little bit of a by-the-book-guy for our crowd, but he’s good people.”

“That psychologist - did you see the interview?” You ask.

Nat shakes her head and turns on one of the shower heads, testing the temperature with her hand before stepping back and pulling out soap and shampoo and conditioner and setting them along the tiled wall that divides each of the single-shower spaces. “No, had to keep Tony and Steve from throwing punches.” At your raised eyebrow she smiles. “Long-ish story. I’ll trade you over food in the cafeteria.” Her nose wrinkles. “After you shower. You smell like…”

You flush at the reminder. “Sweat?”

“And sex.” There it is - that cautious watchfulness, that soft tone. The unspoken question and language used by women to ask without asking. “Wash up, y/n. I’ll be waiting outside.”

The shower - private and hot, so-fucking-hot-thank-you-baby-jesus - goes a long way towards making you feel human again. The fatigue has definitely taken root by the time you shuffle into the hallway, in jeans and t-shirt with an oversize hoodie.

Nat takes one look at you and laughs. 

You toss her the bird as she loops one arm through your own and your guard falls in behind the pair of you.

“You look like you’re about ready to drop, y/n.”

“Long day, Nat. Long day.”

“Well,” She says. “Let me get some food in you and you can sleep it off.”

Two sandwiches and an extra large latte later, your eyes are sliding shut, slumped in a chair while Sam and Steve pace the fishbowl of a conference room in alternating turns.

Outside the room are security feeds showing you all angles on Barnes, and if you weren’t so goddamn done with this day, you’d have asked Nat to leave you somewhere - anywhere - else.

You’ve had enough of Bucky Barnes for one lifetime, thank you very much.

You manage to crack one eyelid open as the blonde agent from the garage enters the room. Words are exchanged, light and easy, despite the tense situation, and you’ve almost drifted back off when the woman presses a button on the conference connector and suddenly, the not-so-good-doctor’s voice is flooding the room.

_ “I just want to ask you a few questions…” _

You give up on sleep and see Sam clock the wordless exchange between Steve and the blonde before waggling his eyebrows at you. You raise yours back in a wordless ‘oh really?’, and he nods, once, with a quick smile tucked around his lips before he too turns this attention to the screen.

Huh, you think, looking over the blonde agent again with a different view. Good for you, Stevie.

And then the power goes out.


	15. Shatter

“I’m not here to judge you.” The man outside the cage - because for all its glass and metal instead of bars, that is what he’s sitting in - says in tones that are meant to be reassuring. “I just want to ask you a few questions. Do you know where you are, James?”

He doesn’t respond. He knows the date and the year and he’s in a secure facility.

He knows who he was born as - James Buchannon Barnes, with the easy gait and the quick smile. Defender of Steve Rogers. Doll-dizzy boy turned into a man by a war and the sound of his sniper rifle firing away. 

He knows what Hydra turned him into - The Asset, the Winter Soldier. The Ghost in the back of his mind at all times, always watching, always wary, who can't quite see the world in anything other than cool grayscale.

And he knows what he is now - a Frankenstein’s Monster of a man somewhere between and not-quite separate from the others.

He wishes he didn’t know that he was broken, broken beyond repair. Three parts of a whole that’s been so fragmented and fucked up they don’t fit together anymore - Him, James, and the Asset. Not unless you’re there. 

You're the fucking glue that holds him together, and even though his sharp edges slice you up in the process, no part of him is willing to let you go.

His heart tries to speed up just thinking about you, and he forces himself to breathe, slow and steady, before the Asset really wakes up in your absence.

The Asset doesn’t care about anything, or anyone. Not really. It’s the part of his brain that responds to pain, and fear, and violence. And all it knows is that when you’re around, those things are  _ less _ . So when you aren’t there...well, The Asset really doesn’t like that. The Asset is...unpredictable...when faced with the threat of losing you, but right now, that part of him is tucked away, though he’s watching through Bucky’s eyes all the same.

James cares too much, and where the Asset is a cold bite of snow and steel and violence, more often than not, James is soft. Playful and less careful. Never careless. He’s a radio song in the back of his mind all the time, sometimes drowned out by the other noise in his head, and sometimes he’s there, with his hand at your shoulder blade as he pulls you close for a dance.

You bring out James, and let the Asset finally sleep, and even though he knows you’re somewhere in this building, all parts of him are turning anxious at the loss of you.

“I can’t help you if you don’t talk to me, James.”

The correction slips out before he can stop it. “My name is Bucky.”

The doctor - shrink, whatever - continues smoothly, without pause, and it trips every instinct he has. Something is not right here... “Tell me, Bucky. You've seen a great deal, haven't you?”

“I don't want to talk about it.”

“You fear that… if you open your mouth, the horrors might never stop. Don't worry.” The doctor looks down at his screen, smiles and presses a finger to it as the rock of foreboding drops in Bucky’s stomach and the doctor’s hand slides into his bag. He pulls out a red notebook -  _ the _ red notebook and Bucky feels his entire body clench. “We only have to talk about one.”

“What the hell is this?” All parts of him are screaming now - Asset, James, and Bucky alike because that notebook will remove the one thing all three of them depend on - control.

“Why don't we discuss your home? Not Romania. Certainly not Brooklyn, no. I mean, your real home.” 

Cold sweat breaks out along his spine as he sees that black star on the cover of the journal.

He should have known, he thinks as the doctor stands and walks closer. He should have known that they weren’t done with him. Wouldn’t let him go.

“Желание.” Longing

“No.” He shuts his eyes as the word reaches down, into the conditioning and he can feel it take hold inside of his mind like a fist, feel the Asset sharpening, rising, feel James slipping away.

“Ржавый.” Rusted.

“Stop.” His voice breaks. He doesn’t want this - he doesn’t want to go back to being the Asset, the Soldat. No no no no...He’d just started to remember the important things - just started to remember Brooklyn and really remember Steve...And he has you, you who anchor him with words and warmth, to the here and now, however unwilling...

“Семнадцать.” Seventeen.

His arm is starting to shake, both fists clenched as he starts to pull against the restraints. Feels the give in them, knows if he can get out before the last word, he can pummel this man into pulp before he erases the pieces of Bucky Barnes that are all he has to hold onto. “Stop.”

“Рассвет.” Daybreak

He screams as he strains against the restraints, feels them give, lurches forward and sinks his metal fist into the frame of the door with his entire weight behind it.

“Печь.” Furnace “Девять.” Nine.

Again, he slams his fist against the door. Again, again.

“Добросердечный.” Benign.

As hard as he can now because he can’t stand the thought of losing control, the thought that maybe this time will be the time where he vanishes again, and for good.

“Возвращение на Родину.” Homecoming “Один.” One “Грузовой вагон.” Freight car

And Bucky Barnes disappears.


	16. Unrecovered

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> a/n: oh nos!

“Sub level five, east wing.” Blondie says to Steve and Sam, who take off running.

Shit.

You should let them go, you think as you push to your feet, exhaustion vanishing under the new wave of adrenaline as the room outside the fishbowl scrambles. It’s a building full of honest-to-god heroes, let them take care of it. You being there might help, might hurt, it’s not worth it to find out...

You’re five steps behind them before you finish the thought, cursing yourself the whole time as you haul through the facility on the heels of Steve and Sam.

You’re not an Avenger anymore. 

Bucky Barnes is not your goddamn responsibility, and you sure as hell don't owe him anything.

This  _ will _ bite you in the ass, without a doubt, and it will not get you home any sooner. In fact, it’ll probably land you in a black site prison knowing how 'justice' systems work.

But you follow Captain America once more into the breach, and it feels  _ right _ and comforting and most importantly - it feels like  _ you _ again.

Steve and Sam slow as they round the corner, and you suck in lungfuls of air with gratitude.

Sam’s eyebrow goes up as Steve steps through the door.

“Okay,” You admit. “I’m a little out of shape. But I can still kick  _ your  _ ass, Wilson.”

And you follow him into carnage, bodies on the floor, just in time to see Steve stalk towards the doc, who’s lying on the floor, tightly controlled anger in every step.

_ Where’s Barnes? _ You wonder as Sam moves to join Steve, and your question is answered with the sound of a metal fist crumbling the doorframe.  _ There he is… _

Barnes makes quick work of Sam and you wince because this...this is the Winter Soldier and he’s not pulling any of his punches as he tosses Sam into the containment pod and down goes Wilson as Barnes’ eyes turn to you, stuck standing on the other side of the doorway still, feet fixed to the floor like a goddamn civvie because Barnes’ eyes are hotly possessive as he gazes at you, chest heaving and nostrils flaring from the fight.

And then Steve is there, between the two of you and you watch Barnes’ eyes go  _ cold _ .

He kicks Steve through the door and you scramble out of the way. No fucking way in hell are you getting between two super soldiers in a fight. Nopesie daisies and a hard pass, thank you very much.

So while Barnes drives Steve back, you turn your attention to Wilson, checking his pulse, and feeling your whole body shudder with relief as you find it strong and steady.

And the good doctor pulls a gun on you as Barnes shoves Steve down the elevator shaft.

“I knew this was going to bite me in the ass.” You hiss to Sam’s unconscious body, moving your open hands up and away from your body.

“No good deed goes unpunished.” The Doc - whoever the hell he is - agrees, and gestures for you to stand, and then move into the hallway. “Though I must say, I’m not going to complain about the vagaries of fate when they work in my favor.”

“What do you want?” You ask, as the Doc peers down the elevator shaft. 

You try not to think about how quiet it is.

“To topple an empire.” He gestures with the gun for you to keep moving. “I’m afraid I must insist on your company, agent y/l/n. At least we will have much to talk about on our journey.”

Sam groans softly as he opens his eyes. Barnes hits like a goddamn Mac truck…He’s going to bruise some interesting shades over the next few days, that’s for sure...

He sees you first, standing by the elevator. Then he sees the gun, and the doctor. You’re shaking your head, but Sam can’t hear the words. He blinks a couple of times - cause that’ll help his hearing right? - and tries to lever himself upright as he watches you move into action.

You’re the kind of agent who used to run with the Avengers, but it’s obvious your body is at it’s limit, and the doctor is no psychologist Sam’s ever seen, not with the way he moves through your strikes.

It’s over by the time Sam gets himself upright - a quick hit with the pistol to the back of the head and your body drops. 

“Hey!” Sam shouts, trying to stagger to his feet.

The doctor just looks at him as he catches your unconscious weight, and in a move that is surprising for someone so slender, tosses you over his shoulder in a fireman’s carry.

Oh hell no. They just got you back.

He rocks up, finally finding his feet and staggers after him.


	17. Confessional Armbar

When the world comes back to him, he feels like shit.

His arm - the metal one - is pinned, immobile. His body feels like a truck hit it. For all he knows, a truck  _ did _ hit it, while he waits for his brain to catch back up. It feels like a hangover from hell and that’s saying something even though he hasn’t been drunk since a little after Steve rescued him in the war.  _ Can’t _ get drunk, thanks to Zola’s serum.

He takes a minute as he shifts through the wreckage inside his head. What does he remember?

He remembers Steve and you and the war and Hydra and all of it.

You. What happened to you?

Every part of his brain comes alive in a painful rush of panic as footsteps draw close. He doesn’t have to look up to know who they belong to. “Steve.”

“Which Bucky am I talking to?” There’s hope in those eyes as Bucky glances up.

Not even a full day ago, he’d played dumb - pretended his memories weren’t what they were. But now he’s remembering - the codebook, violence, your eyes wide and frightened - and he doesn’t have time for this because his gut tells him you aren’t here. “Your mom's name was Sarah.” He laughs and shakes his head a little. “You used to wear newspapers in your shoes.” He swallows, hard, and hopes it’s not a mistake to ask the most important question first. “Where’s y/n?”

“The good doctor grabbed her in the chaos.” Bucky doesn’t know this man, but he stands like a soldier, and his eyes are narrowed suspiciously at Bucky. “Any ideas on why he would do that?”

Too many, and none of them good as Bucky finds himself grappling for control against the Asset. When he looks up, Steve and the new guy are eyeing him with a wariness he recognizes. It’s the kind of look you give a mad dog when you aren’t sure if it’ll bite you or not, and he can’t exactly fault them for it.

“ ‘S okay,” He says, the instinct to reassure Steve too strong to fight. “ ‘M under control. Mostly.” He adds with a little smile he doesn’t feel. “What did I do?”

“Enough.”

He lets his head drop. “God, I knew this would happen.” He tries to think,  _ focus _ past the rising rage in his head as the Asset absorbs your absence, mouth forming replies as Steve continues on. All the while in his head is the steadily rising chant - demand for your presence.

Why would the doc have taken you? Had they said something - when they’d lost control - that told him how important you were? No...No, he’s sure of that much at least. Even under the grip of someone else’s control, he wouldn’t have done something to put you in harm’s way. He’s certain of it.

Why else would he have taken you…

“He wanted to know about Siberia.” All thoughts converge on that point, and he can feel his heart begin to pick back up as his stomach sinks.

Siberia.

Flashes, partial memories, but none of them pleasant. Training, endless training, hurt or be hurt. Madness and bloodshed and violence. And cold. Always cold.

“Why would he need to know that?”

“Because,” He admits, “I’m not the only Winter Soldier.”


End file.
